But these new markets will only be opened up IF: the recurring payment services are easy to use (frictionless) and protect the security concerns of both consumers and businesses.

Adopting best practices in recurring and subscription payments

Adyen, the leading omni-channel payment provider, believe that it is crucial to maximize authorization rates for signups and subsequent payments. They talked to some of the world’s leading subscription and recurring companies to find out how they approach payments for maximum growth. The discussion revealed that a carefully planned and executed strategy leads to improved customer experience, increased retention, and, for larger businesses, millions of dollars in revenue uplift.

Based on their findings some the key best practices in collecting recurring payments from consumers are:

Enable recurring and subscription payments with key local payment methods.

Business-2-Business payments

These techniques also apply, with minor changes, to B2B payments. The key problem to be overcome in B2B payments is establishing a trading relationship where direct debiting from a card or bank account will be acceptable, this requires analysis of:

What is basic part of your products or services, and what changes?

Can you isolate the recurring part(s) from the changeable parts?

Whether the recurring part of your services/products can packaged, and positioned acceptably for your regular customers?

As Adyen pointed out that for consumers, a carefully planned and executed strategy leads to improved customer experience, and increased retention. The same applies to B2B sales as well.

CTMfile take: Remember many of your business customers are probably using Spotify or Apple Music already, they won’t be as resistant as you think to direct debiting for much of what they buy from you, particularly if you package it sensitively and appropriately.